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New submitter dandv writes with a story from VentureBeat about another entry in the race to escape national jurisdiction by offshoring work — literally offshoring, that is : "Blueseed is a Silicon Valley company that plans on launching a cruise ship 30 minutes from the coast of California, housing startup entrepreneurs from around the world. These startuppers won't need to bother with U.S. visas, because the ship will be in international waters. They'll have to pay tax to whatever country they're incorporated in, though. So far, 146 startups said they'd like to come to the ship."

You can remotely access and program pretty much any system you'd ever work on in an offshoring relationshing. Your physical location has little or nothing to do with the ability to provide the contracted services.

While there is demand for at least some of the offshore service provider's staff to be working on-site with the customer companies, you wouldn't be able to do that with this ship. You still wouldn't have a visa, so you still wouldn't be allowed to "land" from the ship for such meetings.

In order to be in international waters, the ship would be what, 200 miles out from shore? That's a pretty long ride for any landbound customers to take in order to come meet with you on the ship. Customers don't tend to meet at provider sites; they expect the provider to come to them.

That being the case, what is the actual purpose served by working on this ship?

Or is this like the old Sealand failure? A great idea in concept that has no practical purpose and few real backers?

The advantage of these ventures is that they're outside national jurisdiction. The problem with these ventures is that they're outside national jurisdiction - and for almost every company out there, they benefit from the protection of a country's laws more than they suffer from them.

Sealand failed because anyone who hosted data there was wide open to the whim of Roy Bates - and if you didn't like his whim, you had no recourse. This will be no different.

The advantage of these ventures is that they're outside national jurisdiction. The problem with these ventures is that they're outside national jurisdiction - and for almost every company out there, they benefit from the protection of a country's laws more than they suffer from them.

Sealand failed because anyone who hosted data there was wide open to the whim of Roy Bates - and if you didn't like his whim, you had no recourse. This will be no different.

They would be within US waters, so the Coast Guard would still protect them from pirates. The landlord/tenant problem is a big one though since they would need their own police and court system... and we have all seen how well private courts work.

Yep. That is the idea. Reap the benefits they want directly want, get the advantages of benefits that effect them indirectly (like the education system), but not have to pay for any of it and claim with a strait face that they are dong the capitalist thing of paying only for services they use.

You know, the real disadvantages of having the oppressive, income taxing government are much greater than the perceived advantage of having an 'educated' population. The so called education system is in a huge bubble in USA, people are getting gov't guaranteed loans - basically free money, because whatever they don't pay out in 15 years is forgiven, and the maximum amount anybody is going to have to pay monthly is only on top of 2 minimum poverty levels, and then it's only a 10% of that so called 'discretio

It seems particularly odd when one considers the fact that you don't need to spend months on a boat 200 miles off California to enjoy the privilege of booking a slightly-eyebrow-raising percentage of your profits through an anodyne corporate PO box in some sunny tax haven. You can do that from the comfort of your own home.

Is there a large market of non-US-citizens who can't secure visas(or who find longterm shipboard stays more comfortable than flying out for a meeting?) but desperately crave physical proximity to silicon valley, possibly along with an internet connection to it that is far suckier than a hardline from virtually anywhere in the not-actively-fighting-a-brutal-meatgrinder-bush-war world?

I understand the appeal of tax dodges; but I don't understand what this boat concept brings to the game.

Realisticly it doesn't actually bring much, but it draws on a rather heavy Ayn Rand mythology that they are hoping to capitalize on. The theory is supposed to be that if you take away all those pesky regulations then 'real entrepreneurs '.. some kind of the 'the best rise in power when not being kept down by other people in power, except each other since that is dog eat dog, but because people who already have power are bad we need to stop them, but not new power which should be unchecked'. So beyond just taxes and visas they can suspend things like workers rights, wages, etc... so all those pesky things like stopping child labor, taking sexual advantage of your subordinates, firing injured people, making them work 140 hour weeks but still in debt to the company store, all those things are perfectly legal again... and part of the mythology is whitewashing how badly those went the first time around.

Oh, and of course the ship will probably have its own company store.. so everyone there will have to pay whatever prices the Blueseed charges for things like food, power, internet access, etc.

Which is why sane companies will probably stay away, but gullible startups who have read more fiction then done research might find the place appealing.

That's one of the problems with libertarian dreamers. They crave a dog-eat-dog world, but they all think THEY'RE going to be one of the top dogs. They watch Firefly and think they're going to be Malcolm Reynolds. It never occurs to them that the vast, vast, vast majority of citizens in a truly libertarian system would basically be dirt-poor slaves to a handful of top dogs, and the odds of you being one of those top dogs (unless you're *already* very wealthy and powerful) is slim to none.

*nods* it dovetails into the idea that somehow the people who do have power do not deserve it or got it illegitimately. Though it also depends heavily on the idea that states and companies are fundamentally different and that unless one has a police force then they can not exert control of other people's lives... thus they do not see the power of non-government entities as 'real'... thus anyone who is a 'dirty poor slave' is simply lazy or immoral since nothing is stopping them from being rich.

In terms of government, Libertarians simply want to take over - and then leave you alone. That's the extent of it.

And by "leave you alone", they mean allowing any employer to mistreat you as much as they want, and giving you no fucking recourse whatsoever. They mean allowing any company to pour whatever toxic sludge in the environment that they want, and forcing YOU to bear the burden of trying to prove they did some harm, against their legion of highly trained lawyers.

You have no clue whatsoever what the people in charge of the "Libertarians" think. You cannot learn from history, and see how bad this shit would be.

That's one of the problems with libertarian dreamers. They crave a dog-eat-dog world, but they all think THEY'RE going to be one of the top dogs.

Wrong. In a truly dog-eat-dog world, any dog that gets too far ahead gets eaten by the pack...

Libertarians have no desire for power. They just want to see limited power OVER THEM. You seeing it as a quest for power over others is more revelatory to your own subconscious desires and/or fears than that of Libertarians.

Basically, you apparently can't handle a world where you are not on a leash...

Wrong. In a truly dog-eat-dog world, any dog that gets too far ahead gets eaten by the pack.

Yeah, except it has never once worked out that way in reality. In lawless regions or other areas where the government is weak, what inevitably happens is that you end up with a handful of powerful warlords who basically terrorize and dominate the populace. They build up their own private armies to not only protect themselves from the "pack" but to do whatever the fuck else they want too, including showing up at your home periodically to take anything they want and rape your wife. Life is great if you happen to be one of those warlords (or one of their family or close friends). Life is complete shit if you're anyone else.

And you're not escaping the leash. You're just trading in the democratic government leash for the much tighter and shorter leash that the rich and powerful will have you on in your libertarian paradise.

Given the choice of two jobs, one where you must sleep with ugly superiors and one where you can tell them to fuck off, people will generally prefer the non-prostitution job.

Why yes, they probably would. Doesn't mean they'd actually have much choice in the matter, however. You're going to reply with some bullshit about quitting, and then I'm going to remind you that the subordinate in question needs the job in order to keep a roof over their head, and to feed their family. And that jobs are quite scarce.

You are honestly forgetting the entirety of why the labor movement started. Do you honestly think that if it was so easy as to just "quit and find a new job", that the labor mov

child labor stopped - answer: we stopped needing them to work to avoid starvation and grownups are generally more productive (productivity which leads to excess, excess which allows for the leisure to learn)

And yet at least one Republican candidate publicly challenges child labor laws and proposes that kids get put to work to replace the adult janitors on the (government) payroll.

X0 hour work weeks - this is debatable but things were trending in a given direction but given the nature of this offshore ventur

In order to be in international waters, the ship would be what, 200 miles out from shore?

I've looked into cruising and the myriad of laws. First of all you just described the EEZ limit which controls "traditional money making activities and environmental laws" but expressly does not include loitering. So its a fuzzy zone. The coast guard can order you to not discharge your blackwater tanks, cannot tell you not to just sit/anchor there, can tell you not to fish there, and running an office is somewhat vague.

The contiguous zone is 24 miles and you must follow customs laws presumably including visas. This is a recent "American Empire" turn of the century thing and the whole world used to (still does?) respect only 12 miles. In the REALLY olden days before the previous turn of the century it was defined as a cannon shots length, or so I'm told, like a mile or two.

This is very important to cruisers... more than 200 miles away you can technically tell all authorities other than your flag nation to F-off, but you need to stay at least 24 miles away or else have to go thru customs, and in that range from 24 to 200 miles you sorta have to listen to them. Customs is not necessarily the end of the world, but its nice to not even have to think about it. For example, say you were sailing from California to Alaska, it would be extremely advisable to stay at least 24 miles away from the Canadian shore.

Disclaimer, I've done hundreds of hours of sailing on little craft, mostly inland, but never across an ocean.

30 miles in a 150 knot helicopter for the VCs to visit you is what, 12 minutes of flight? I'm not seeing this as a serious issue. Also I can see a pleasure cruise on a well appointed yacht when making visits rather than flying, if they're in the mood for some fun.

This is very important to cruisers... more than 200 miles away you can technically tell all authorities other than your flag nation to F-off

This is mostly true, and can bite them in the butt.

If they intend to operate out of US ports, and provide anything that even looks remotely like passenger service (I.E. hosting staff for their clients) then they can't exit and re-enter the United States without visiting a "distant foreign port". Back in the day when there was tons of coastwise passenger transport, this protected US firms from foreign competition. Today it mostly means that Alaska cruises have to port at Victoria and Maratimes/East Coast cruises usually in Halifax. For Blueseed this is going to mean visiting Mexico between port visits to the US. (And they *will* either have to visit the US or sail across the Pacific Ocean for servicing - a ship can't stay at sea forever.)

Also, pretty much every nation subscribes to SOLAS and even the flag-of-convenience nations have safety requirements. Not to mention, that if they ever port, they'll be subject to safety inspections by the Coast Guard of the nation they're porting in. These are non-trivial to comply with and are deadly serious - the can be at a minimum refused entry, or at worst impounded for failing to comply. On top of these inspections, if they hope to carry insurance, the ship will have to regularly be inspected and certified on a regular basis by a legitimate classification society...

These "tech Love Boat" companies all sound to me to have based their plans on urban legends about how the law of the sea and related conventions work, and not on any real world legal and business research.

In order to be in international waters, the ship would be what, 200 miles out from shore?

They said 30 minutes, so they are probably talking about the 12 nautical mile territorial boundary. A cruise ship can probably do 24 knots if it really is going all-out, so while this is a bit of a stretch it is technically correct.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_waters [wikipedia.org] Territorial waters, or a territorial sea, as defined by the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea,[1] is a belt of coastal waters extending at most 12 nautical miles (22 km; 14 mi) from the baseline (usually the mean low-water mark) of a coastal state. The territorial sea is regarded as the sovereign territory of the state, although foreign ships (both military and civilian) are allowed innocent passage through it; this sovereignty also extends t

Well, their plan is they will not be in international waters so the commute is pretty short. Instead they will fly the flag of some minor country and anchor within US waters, which is a legal grey area that in theory should leave them outside US/CA regulation/taxation yet still be able to commute in for meetings.

But as others have pointed out it has many of the same problems as Sealand did. It is a nice concept in theory and in fiction, but in reality such plans have significant issues and, for their customers, end up with the same basic issues that basing out of a major country has with the added problem of not having a robust legal system. If nothing else, one of their big claims is that they avoid the 'immigration' problem.. by implementing their own immigration system. So you still have to go through an immigration process, just an easier to bribe one.

I am skeptical that many of these startups are expressing real 'I would pay' interest or have really thought about the full legal ramifications of such a setup. Blueseed really seems to be more of a scam to get investor money then anything else.

Check out the laws section of their FAQ... Laws [blueseed.co]. So, there will be American Common Law in place. They aren't claiming to be their own country. Actually, it looks like they are primarily saying "We're Googleplex on water. It's cool!". Whether or not that's enough incentive to actually move your living and working quarters there is another matter. It also appears to me that International laws will apply so folks hoping to run illicit activities from there may still find themselves in hot water. I don't think

You can remotely access and program pretty much any system you'd ever work on in an offshoring relationshing. Your physical location has little or nothing to do with the ability to provide the contracted services.

Yes, but physical location does have a good amount to do with your ability to meet with investors. And there are still some customers who don't like the idea of someone all the way around the world providing their services.

The exclusive economic zone is 200 miles, but International Waters is only 12 miles out.

The residents can get a business visa to come onshore for business meetings, they just can't perform any actual work in the United States.

It's true that the residents must abide by the whims of the owners, but the owners in this case are businessmen who want to create a good space for business in order to stay in business. That's a lot different from relying on the goodwill of a single eccentric individual.

Name one place without "collective dependence on immediately life-critical infrastructure". Unless you are your own doctor, road builder, mechanic, own your own fields to grow food, have a well for water, and a lab to produce medicines that is the reality of modern life.

Nice reference, great game, but here in reality the man did not toil alone. He was not able to produce without the poor being kept away from his warehouse at night, he was not able to risk only his investment by nature but by laws governing incorporation, nor was he able to get it to market without roads. I love how those who have never done a day of physical labor like to talk about sweat, blood and tears though.

It might not be as intensive as you'd expect. This isn't a datacenter, like the failed sealand. It's basically just an office that floats. They'll just have their own servers. All their internet connection is for would be communicating with customers to get specifications and deliver finished data.

None. The "Tech Love Boat" exists solely as a tax and immigration dodge, and its founders are proud of it. May real pirates raid this libertarian haven; may real storms smash its bow. Let me hazard a guess that they'll incorporate in Antigua, and pay no taxes, and that they'll import slave labor from India to work in the bowels of the ship.

Blueseed wants the benefits of proximity with Silicon Valley, and none of the costs. Why should we give a damn about them?

I'd also like to know who these "entrepreneurs" are. Let them live in their cabins and bar them from the shore. They don't want to pay for civilization, due to their brilliant and stunning gifts. They choose to leave civilization to live in their Brave New Race to the Bottom, _stay there_.

When a crime occurs on the "Love Boat", who will settle that crime? Blueseed? So they'll be a government, too. Hmm, maybe an invasion sounds good..

All these Randians will expect the US Government to rescue them when their ship goes tits up. Perhaps the best answer is for the US Coastguard to quote them to provide emergency services - 35% of turnover?

Seriously, it's not a tax dodge, though it is an immigration dodge. It's about startups being able to engage with the tech centre of the world without arbitrary red tape blocking them from doing it on the US mainland.

I don't even understand how you can complain about both immigration and tax avoidance in the same post. If they were allowed to immigrate they would be able to pay tax, if they were allowed to pay tax they'd be able to immigrate. You can't bitch and moan about the two in one sentence, the fact they can't immigrate means they can't pay tax. Whining that people for not paying tax in your country whilst simultaneously implying you don't want them in your country is one of the most laughably irrational arguments I've heard on Slashdot in a while, and in recent months the standard hasn't exactly been particularly high.

The fact that your country is horrendously paranoid, and massively afraid of immigration despite having a relatively tiny population density is why these sorts of far fetched schemes arise in the first place. Of course, none of that would be so bad if it weren't for the fact that your entire nation is built off the back of relatively recent mass immigration.

That was actually my first question : what defensive weapons did they take on-board ? Alternatively, they may negotiate with USA to get protection in exchange of concessions.

There was a thing similar to this that existed once near Italian coasts. It survived for a few years before it was recognized as a mafia operation (I don't know if it started as one, if the mafia took control over it or if it was just an excuse) but the Italian's police (not army) took control of the platform.

There was also this illegal gambling operation off the coast of California [wikipedia.org]. That didn't end well. In fact, practically all these libertarian paradise offshore independent micronations [wikipedia.org] haven't ended well. Either they never really became self-sufficient, the people who ran them turned out to be more dictator-like than anyone wanted to deal with, or they were only intended as a joke in the first place. Evidently starting your own micronation ("with bl

None. The "Tech Love Boat" exists solely as a tax and immigration dodge, and its founders are proud of it. May real pirates raid this libertarian haven

Under international maritime law, all nations have a duty to combat piracy. "Piracy is of note in international law as it is commonly held to represent the earliest invocation of the concept of universal jurisdiction. The crime of piracy is considered a breach of jus cogens, a conventional peremptory international norm that states must uphold. Those committing thefts on the high seas, inhibiting trade, and endangering maritime communication are considered by sovereign states to be hostis humani generis (enemies of humanity)" Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]

The bottom line is that it isn't in the interests of the United States to have pirates operating off the U.S. coast, even if they only target vessels of other nations.

When a crime occurs on the "Love Boat", who will settle that crime?

It is exactly the same legal situation as a crime on a cruise ship. The passengers are subject to the legal sysem of their flag nation, and of others that exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction. The U.S. Constitution gives the federal courts jurisdiction over maritime matters, so it is up to the courts to rule on which particular crimes are worthy of extraterritorial jurisdiction. See In international waters, are you beyond the reach of the law? [straightdope.com]

Why is it that every Libertarian seems to think that they can skirt laws just by taking some boat out to international waters? As if the nearby country is going to be like "Damn, we know you committed the murder, but you were JUST over the line into international waters, so we're going to have to let you go!"

This cruise ship idea is simply based on the idea of escaping the United States extremely high corporate tax, while staying close enough that business can be conducted in person.... as well as to secure protection of the Coast Guard and medial help if needed.

So to not pay taxes but to get the benefits that those taxes provide anyway? So they want to be leeches, how wonderful. Typical libertarian behavior.

What, exactly, is so high about an average of 8% tax rate? Mine is at least three times that for personal income tax. Why do these super-rich fools deserve to pay less of that money, even though they have more?

If you read up on Sealand [wikipedia.org], my favorite incident is the fire that effectively ended that wackjob dream. Here these are these libertarians screaming that they're an independent country and don't have to pay taxes. But then comes a fire and what's the first thing they do? They start screaming for the British Air Force and Navy to come save them.

Libertarians don't want to pay taxes, but let one of them dial 911 just once and be told "Tough shit. Deal with it yourself" and watch them scream like little girls.

According to sources near Blueseed, they plan to charter a regular ship, before raising capital for the barge they have concept drawings of. Question 1: Have they ever lived for a prolonged period on board a ship? Not all cabins are presidential suite standards. I suspect cramped compartments with no port holes and the persisting smell of fuel oil will get the better of the inhabitants' productivity. Question 2: Who will enforce (what?) law and order, when a couple of Aussies start to binge drink, plank on the railing and pick a fight with some English, after which they insult a bunch of more conservative-minded Indian IT-workers, causing all hell to break loose. And who says the US of A will tolerate a floating tax haven right off the coast of silicon valley?

Nah. Most of all, this just looks like a anarcho-libertarian's wet dream.

i had an idea similar to this, a few years ago - not a single boat but a massive platform, housing and providing the resources for people to carry out public-domain scientific research. if the platform were large enough it would be stable even during large storms. it's therefore very very interesting to hear that someone's actually really going ahead with a small-scale software-based version of that idea.

the only problem that i can forsee however is piracy! not of the software, but *real* piracy. in thi

It will be afforded the normal protection due to the ships of the flag carrying nation. It doesn't suddenly become the wild uncontrolled seas once you head out into international waters. I wouldn't be surprised if there are reciprocal aggrements in place that would give say Marshall Islands registered ships some protection from the US Coastguard even though they are in international waters.

It just shows to what extent the governments of the world have pushed the people that they are willing to spend time and money into this, leaving their borders, living uncomfortably on a boat (don't tell me it's very comfortable on a boat, you can't escape the walls, it's going to be tight, it's not a nice living, and obviously it's going to be a sausage-fest).

The entrepreneurial spirit lives on beyond and outside of the thieving governments and

There are already ship rats that live on cruise liners because it's cheaper than other alternatives like a nursing home. There are also long term cruises that the lines don't seem to have any trouble selling either.

Compared to living in some overpopulated urban center (NYC,SFO,London,Mumbai,Tokyo) it might not be so bad really.

People have already done this many times. Every migration has its difficulties and down-sides.

USA was populated with white and other people hundreds of years ago because those people wanted to leave their oppressive governments.

At the time those other governments also wanted to dominate the people who moved onto these new territories, so it's nothing new that the more entrepreneurial folks want to move away and something outside of the boundaries of their respective decadent nations, it's just that there i

Without the government to ensure contract law, nor protect from pirates this will fail. Your fevered dreams are just that. This is only for the wealthiest few. Without those regulations you hate we would have the age of hundreds of years ago. Rocketing forward economy while those who provide the actual labor are barely above starving to death. Sure the economy will do great, do bad that does not reflect the life of the average man in anyway.

Oh yeah? Like the America failed when it fought against the King? Sure, USA is a continent, not a ship, but we don't have more free continents to occupy around. This will have to do for now, until the technology invented on that ship and other ships like it will allow building bigger ships, islands, underwater cities, who knows.

What does that have to do with anything? The USA had a war for independence. We call it a revolution when it really wasn't. Not much changed for the common man. Check out who could vote in those first elections. Things did improve over time, but the English also have those same conditions now, and they still have a Queen.

- bullshit. The freest country was formed, under the Constitution. It's not free anymore, but it built the wealthiest creditor nation, producing cheap, high quality goods. 1870-1913 was the time when the actual middle class was created on this planet - small, medium sized businessmen and professionals.

The rising tide lifted all boats. You are so eager to denounce people who are looking for more freedoms today, you have completely forgotten why people were escaping from their perspectiv

The freest country with slavery and voting for only wealthy white landowners

- first of all, you are saying it like it was a bad thing that only landowners could vote.

As to blacks, as I said, I would NOT have ratified that Constitution with that language in it, but by 1870 the slavery was no longer the same issue at all.

I am against democracy, unless you are mistaken, I am against democracy, AFAIC democracy is mobocracy, it is the gateway to tyranny, that is my conviction.

OTOH having a representative democracy is fine, where a subgroup of people will vote on issues directly, not the entire population.

In 1870 to 1913 we had the beginnings of the labor movement.

- so? There could be no labour movement before there was labour, could there? When everybody is a subsistence farmer, hunter / gatherer, they don't form unions. But that's not why wealth was created at all. Wealth was created by the businesses, not by unions.

The businesses made people productive, provided management, efficient allocation of land, labour and capital and created the goods that actually were then bought by the very people who were working. That's how the tide lifted the boats.

As the free market capitalism provided the profits and investment capital, this was used to acquire and build better tools, making the workers more efficient and productive, and this is why one person could do much more with the tools than anybody before could without those tools, that's what investment is, and that's how a worker becomes more affluent earners - by being more efficient, by doing more with less time. That's why the working hours could eventually be shorted, that's why there were weekends.

Subsistence farmers don't get to enjoy 8 hour days and 5 working day weeks, they don't have that luxury. Only capitalist free market could create that.

The reality is trickle down does not work, and the rich are more than happy to take all the gains.

- nonsense.

This so called 'trickle down economics' is the ONLY economics that works. The more productive a worker at a factory is building cars, the more efficiently the cars are built, they cheaper they can be sold, so that more people buy them, because more profits are made by selling more cheaper products, not fewer more expensive products.

Originally only the very rich could afford cell phones, computers, plasma TVs. Today everybody has them - that's how productive the capitalists made the workers, that everybody can afford these things.

THAT is trickle down economics, THAT is how wealth is distributed in the free market. Your problem is you think about wealth in terms of money - but the best way to treat money is to have it concentrated in the hands of those, who were the best at organising land, capital and labour to produce that profit, that resulted from all those efficiencies and overproduction, and the market willing to pay for those profits.

You are saying that the wealth isn't being distributed? How many cell phones have you had in your life? Cars? Houses? Pairs of clothes? Shoes? TVs? Computers? Tables? Chairs?

You think wealth is what the rich have and you do not? Wealth is what you can use on daily basis, the rich have the WORK.

You think Steve Jobs having spent under 4% of his entire fortune during his life enjoyed the wealth he created by using it? NO. It was all invested, 96% of his wealth was always invested, so that slobs like you could be lifted in the tide that he was busy creating.

So only those with money should be allowed to vote?

- straw man.

The only people who PAY for the music should be able to order it. Those who pay income taxes to the federal gov't are those who should be allowed to vote, nobody else.

If I lose my job and live off my savings for a year I should not be able to vote?

since I was very specifically talking about federal income taxes, your argument about other forms of taxes is moot.

As to 'thinking about what government does in terms of what it spends' - it is the only rational way to think about the government. It doesn't produce anything, it takes taxes and hopefully just spends that rather than also counterfeiting money and borrowing more to spend, so it should spend only what it gets.

Gov't is what it spends on, its spending is completely tied to what it does, 100% of i

So in this magical place there are not going to be any disputes between parties? There will be no crime? There will be no external threats?

There will be no restrictions on who or how many can come on board?

There will be no heath or safety rules?

Seems to me if you have any of those (and many more) problems (and you certainly will) you are going to need a way to resolve them. All you will be doing is creating your own government (something you apparently abhor).

If we had those regulations maybe less people would have been victimized, less crime would have occurred and people may not have lived such short brutal lives.

- NO, what would have happened, would have mean less competition, less economic activity, because rules would have put most people out of rich of running their businesses the way gov't prescribes they must.

Can't make an omelette without braking a bunch of eggs, can't have wealth producing society without an intermediate steps of suffering and hard work and brutality. If you believe you can wave a magic wand and create all the wealth to pay for all this nonsense you are espousing, then you are only guilty o

Am I the only one who read this as "VCs will found a way to get cheap offshore talent under their collective wings by purchasing a cruise ship on which to enslave, err, house their startup 'incubators'"?

I would only get on a boat like this with people I trust. With a start up there is too much risk that the managers are terrible people. The motivations of a start up are not good either. For a startup it is all about cutting costs. Now if an Google rented the whole boat out to work on a specific project that would be different. Then the motivations would be focus and ease of access to people. I would also prefer the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific ocean. Seems like there would be more to do in the Gulf on weekends.

Late 80's: there were a lot of skilled trades and professional labor in the US. Cars, Steel, Mass production, Agriculture, skilled trades, software development, science, NASA, everything was going pretty well compared to today.

mid 90's: NAFTA [wikipedia.org] took root. Companies began leaving in droves to offshore labor to the far east and Mexico. Many companies who wanted to keep the labor at home, had no choice but to follow the leader because they couldn't compete with such cheap labor.

Exactly. The grandparent is complete bullshit and should be modded down.

The US is the world's largest manufacturing nation in terms of economic output. People seem to forget giant companies like Intel, Caterpillar, Boeing, Cisco, ADM etc. not to mention the pharmaceuticals and the farming industry which are world leading. Not only that but the US does it with a mere 8% of its workforce. The economic output of the average US worker is more than 10 times that of his Chinese equivalent because he's more technically skilled and produces far more valuable products in a highly automated setting.

The Boeing main aircraft assembly building in the Seattle area is the largest manufacturing facility in the world.

It was Boeing who discovered the Y2K problem because they are such a large consumer of aluminum they have to project consumption of aluminum a decade in advance so the aluminum industry can scale their capacity to match their consumption.

I don't know where people get the idea the US isn't competitive in manufacturing. It is a huge force on a global scale in manufacturing, and factors like low energy costs because of the vast natural gas reserves being developed are likely to keep it that way. Anyone writing that the US has no manufacturing capability is full of bullshit.

Actually we still have the largest manufacturing sector in the entire world by quite a bit.We have completely and almost totally destroyed our consumer products manufacturing, true. The only thing I've bought in 20 years made in the USA is/was some plastic trash cans and oddly enough a gasket-less aluminum pressure cooker made in Wisconsin.

The whole world depends on the USA either exclusively or as a majority provider for aerospace, mining equipment, heavy stuff like that. To a much lesser extent we still make cranes too. And chemical process equipment although like cranes we're trying to give that away to China as fast as we can. You can almost draw a graph of "unit weight" on the x-axis and percent imported on the y-axis and you'll see damn near a straight line where we import 99% of our kitchenware but we manufacture 99% of the world's production of 100 kiloton and up mining dragline equipment (you know, the things that strip entire mountaintops off?) and practically all mining trucks larger than 100 tons.

You speak of the 80s as if you had not lived in them. In the 80s, people were worried that Japan was taking all our manufacturing.
Now people who need a reason to worry speak of China the same way.

btw NAFTA had nothing to do with the far east. By the late 90s, most low-wage assembly lines in the US were filled with Mexicans anyway, so we had the choice to keep importing immigrants or sending the factories to where they were. Whether you hate immigration or labor more of course will affect your opinion of

1) this is the first boat that is not US flagged to ever sail either in or nearby the USA, and if it docks for repairs it'll be the first time a foreign vessel has ever entered a US port, so no one will have any idea what to do.

2) there exists a single line in the sandy sea bottom, on one side its complete and total utter US control and the other side is all pirates.

3) magically, because this platform has servers instead of oil drilling equipment, decades of regulation and case law from the oil biz could not possibly apply to this biz, just because it makes for a nice sounding argument.

4) no one has ever lived on a boat for an extended length of time, nor is it even theoretically possible, much less comfortable.

5) the relationship must be binary, either a ship and its flag nation must be US lapdogs and hard core statists, or it must be a libertarian paradise, and only one of those possibilities is unrealistic therefore it Must be the other far extreme possibility (laughably goes for both sides arguments)

6) Foreigners and foreign sailors have never been present on a ship entering a us port, so no one will have any idea what to do.

7) Closely tied to #5, There are only binary governments, the hard core statist fascist western govts like the us and our european lapdogs, and pure capitalist anarchy, therefore since its probably going to be flagged out of panama or something, and panama isn't quite the usa, therefore slavery and polygamy will rule the ship. Uh, no. I don't think very many flag nations allow that on their ships. As a wild guess, I've been on cruise ships that are panama registered, if this tub's panama registered it'll be about as wild as a cruise ship... probably a nude tanning deck, a casino to gamble in, no secret police checking to see if couples in bed together are married (to each other) and are of the correct gender, and generally anyone looking "old enough" gets to drink alcohol and smoke tobacco although technically you have to be 18 in Panama (I think). That's probably about as wild as Panama is going to let it get.

8) A crime has never before happened on board a ship, therefore no one will have any idea how to handle a criminal activity if one happens.

I don't think vlm was espousing the list as his opinion, he was just summarizing.
Reality is going to work like this (assuming the boat ever leaves port):
At some point the ship needs to come into port for maintenance, repairs, you name it. DHS and Customs decides on a "Health and Welfare" inspection of a ship entering a US controlled port. At that point the cramped conditions, poor maintenance, foul sanitation, etc etc etc will be found out and the ship will not be allowed to leave port until it cleans u

The same companies can set up in Anguilla, be outside the US, have no corporate tax, have real tax treaties and IP treaties, and go to the beach after lunch. Fiber to the US, low latency connections, stable economic situation and no need to rely on the boat owner to keep the thing afloat.Handled properly, they would have much less hassle.

The problem with Anguilla, BWI is that it is situated in the Caribbean Sea, and stubbornly refuses to budge from that location. Blueseed is for people who place a high value on physical proximity to and face-to-face interaction with people in Silicon Valley, but for whom a location in the US doesn't work. These people may be wrong, but it's at least a plausible idea.

Crime will happen. Even just low level stuff, like stealing someones wallet. Sorry for all you pie in the sky people, but it will happen. How would rules be enforced? Who? Some onboard constabulary? By what authority? Company rules?
What happens when there are more serious crimes? Rape, assault, etc. Walk the plank? Or just send them home, unpunished?

What Blueseed is proposing to do is create a new sliver of foreign territory (probably Bahamian or Marshallese) 12 miles outside Silicon Valley. Locating a new business there is no more a tax or immigration dodge than setting up across the Canadian or Mexican border would be. Even though some people might like it otherwise, US tax and immigration law applies only to US territory and US citizens and residents.

The US VC's funding the startups will pay US taxes. US citizens working onboard will pay US tax

Off-shore in deep water, there is absolutely no danger whatsoever from a tsunami. A tsunami is only a problem as it reaches shore, as it's there that the very long period waves just keep coming and coming and piling up water. In deep water, there's just a very, very long swell of minuscule amplitude.

Storm waves are vastly more significant. Their period is short enough and their amplitude great enough to potentially cause significant damage to oceangoing vessels. Considering also the occasional rogue wav

When the nearest hospital is over 200 miles away, you'd better have helicopters ready to make the jump. And you'd better have them cleared for permission to enter US air space with no notice (like that's going to happen).

This is just another scam. Another variant of the "company town", where they deduct your room and board and other expenses from your pay, and if at some point you don't like it, you can take a long walk off a short plank.

When the nearest hospital is over 200 miles away, you'd better have helicopters ready to make the jump. And you'd better have them cleared for permission to enter US air space with no notice (like that's going to happen).

You've just described the situation of an oil platform in the GoM. I'm completely unimpressed. This kind of stuff was figured out 40 or so years ago.

That oil platform makes money hand over fist and is owned and operated by a company the US government has some say over. If you don't want Government restrictions/protections the situation will be very different.

The nationality of the platform and helicopter and hospital could all be different. This is old stuff.The FAA does not run a credit check on you when you file a flightplan.It is important to note the profound difference in maritime and aviation regulations WRT to normal daily operations vs declared medical emergencies. Generally in emergencies you have to do less/no paperwork before hand and about three times as much afterward.

It might be awkward or expensive... you might find a coastie or air force aircr

Remember - the US has NOT ratified the "Law of the Sea" treaty - UNCLOS. Under existing international law, they still have jurisdiction out to the 200 mile limit, not just the 12 mile territorial water limit, nor the additional 12 mile exclusion zone.

Other nations have the right to "innocent passage". A barge anchored within 200 miles is not engaged in "innocent passage", and as such, does not have the legal rights enjoyed by vessels engaged in "innocent passage."

However, even vessels engaged in "innocent passage" still need to conform to the sovereign states requirements for things like a valid insurance policy for indemnification in the case of bunker oil spills, etc. right out to the 200 mile limit.